


just in case we meet again (and fall in love)

by explicitly_iridescent



Category: TWICE (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/F, it gets fluffier, mina is a sweetheart, sana dies and momo's a mess, they're all just trying, this is kinda angsty at first
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-06
Updated: 2020-05-09
Packaged: 2021-03-02 20:01:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24032434
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/explicitly_iridescent/pseuds/explicitly_iridescent
Summary: It’s not a bad way to wake up, Momo decides. At least she still gets to wake up next to her.Sana is a ghost, Momo is being haunted, and Mina might start helping Momo believe in the healing. (Starts with SaMo, MiMo ending).
Relationships: Chou Tzuyu/Son Chaeyoung, Hirai Momo/Minatozaki Sana, Hirai Momo/Myoui Mina, Im Nayeon/Yoo Jeongyeon
Comments: 9
Kudos: 71





	1. how unfair (it's just our luck)

**Author's Note:**

> THIS is a SLOWBURN and it's pretty SaMo heavy in the first few chapters, and really MiMo heavy in the last few! Please leave kudos n comments as they keep me motivated :)

Momo wakes up, and sees Sana sitting on the edge of the bed, smiling at her. She sits up, and Sana smiles.

“Good morning,” Sana greets her, and no one will hear it. She leans in to kiss Momo lightly on the cheek.

Momo doesn’t feel it. “Good morning,” she says after a while.

It’s not a bad way to wake up, Momo decides. At least she still gets to wake up next to her.

//

Being haunted by a ghost was something Momo was still getting used to. At first, it had been scary. She threw things, and yelled profanities, and swore. She even briefly decided she was crazy, because _Sana was dead_. And if Sana was dead, then why was she there every time Momo woke up, and walked around, and went to bed? If Sana was dead, why did she still exist around Momo as if she wasn’t?

The first time Sana showed up was a week after the funeral. Momo had been a mess. She’d taken a leave from university, and spent her days sitting by Sana’s grave, gardening out nonexistant weeds, putting flowers, and food, and other things, and then going home to cry herself to sleep. She’d avoided everyone—ignored Jihyo’s worried calls, avoided Jeongyeon’s searching gazes, pretended Chaeyoung and Tzuyu weren’t worried about her, and made sure to duck out of the way when Dahyun and Nayeon went to visit Sana’s grave too.

Mina’s the only one Momo doesn’t have to avoid, because Mina doesn’t show up. Mina hasn’t been around since the funeral.

Momo can’t find it in herself to be worried. After all, Mina isn’t dead. No one else is. Only Sana.

So, Sana shows up, apparates right next to Momo at the graveyard. “Momo! I missed you!” She exclaims, and then—

“What the fuck?!” Momo yells, and she has to stop herself from tripping over her own feet.

“I’m gone for a week, and _that’s_ how you greet me?” Sana says, pouting. She crosses her arms.

Momo blinks: once, twice, and thrice just to be sure. “I’ve gone crazy. That’s it. I’m fucking insane.”

Sana shakes her head and laughs. “You were always a little crazy, Momo.”

Momo doesn’t say anything, doesn’t know what to say. She stares hard at Sana, and it’s _Sana_ —her hair is still dyed light pink and blonde, and her smile is still her smile, and she’s wearing the pastel pink shirt she was wearing the last time Momo had seen her, and she’s here.

Momo keeps staring. Sana takes a few steps forward and throws her arms out. “Hug me, you dummy!”

Momo yells instead, picks up one of the boquets she’d left at the grave, and throws it at her. It doesn’t work. Instead it goes through Sana.

“I’m going to ignore the fact that you tried to hurt me,” Sana mutters, “and ask you to hug me again!”

Momo doesn’t. She runs.

//

The second time Sana comes to her is when she wakes up a day after the graveyard incident. Momo was convinced she’d gone crazy, and knew she probably needed to rest, to sleep. In her dreams is where Sana’s the most alive. In her dreams, Sana doesn’t leave. In her dreams, Sana’s still there, holding her hand, laughing with her over ramen, bringing her jokbal, and dancing with her by the park.

In her dreams, Momo tells Sana she loves her in a hundred different ways she never did when she had the chance.

When Momo opens her eyes, sad that her and Sana hanging out at the park was just that: another dream, she wakes up to Sana hovering over her face with a megawatt smile.

Momo shrieks. She grabs her pillow, throws it at Sana, and yells again.

Her roommates, Nayeon, Jeongyeon, and Jihyo come bursting in. They mostly left her alone, and allowed themselves to be avoided or ignored, but they were probably concerned, because even Momo had never yelled that way before.

Sana disappears, with a frown.

Momo is pale and looks more like a ghost when the three girls come in and hold her.

//

Momo never got to say goodbye. It was just one of those things, she supposes. Everyone tells her it’s normal, a lot of people never do get to say goodbye, but Momo had thought maybe life would make her an outlier and be a little kinder. Sana had made her believe in a better world; a world where happy endings could exist, and happy beginnings and maybe even happy middles. That was Sana’s effect: a bright genuine smile, hopeful words, and a heart that could carry the world.

When Sana entered Momo’s life, she believed she deserved happiness, and Momo guessed, it was fitting that now that Sana was gone, all the happy things would go too.

Saying goodbye was just another privilege that was torn away from her, because Sana was gone, and all the good things left with her. In a word without Sana, there are no goodbyes, no happy endings, and certainly good mornings for Momo.

//

The third time, Momo allows herself to let her gaurd down. Sana comes to her, an apparition once more, when Momo is at the park. It’s 10pm, cold, and lonely.

Momo doesn’t hear her come, or see her. She turns her head, as if a part of her knows Sana will be sitting next to her.

She was right. Sana gives her a wary look. “Are you going to yell again?” she softly asks.

Momo shakes her head, suddenly very tired. She doesn’t remember what it feels like to be rested, to be happy, to be full. She suddenly feels exhausted, and cold, and alone. If she’s gone crazy and started imagining Sana, then what? Fine, she’s crazy then. If Sana really is a ghost, then what? Okay, ghosts exist. She can’t fight herself any longer.

“I’m crazy, aren’t I?” Momo breathes out, looking at Sana as if seeing her for the first time in a long time.

Sana chuckles and shrugs. “Maybe.”

“Am I just imagining you?”

Sana raises an eyebrow. “I don’t know, but I’m here aren’t I?”

“You’re a ghost?”

Sana shrugs. “Seems like it.”

Momo and her stare at each other, and Momo says, “okay.”

“Okay?”

“Yeah, okay.”

//


	2. sandbox love (it never dies)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Momo runs into Mina. A part of the past is explained.

The weeks pass, and soon, it’s been two months already. Momo hasn’t put her life back together, doesn’t know where it begins, and where the middle is, only knows she’s somehow skipped all of that and made it to some sort of dead end. Her professors are still lenient, and she still has two more months left before she has to return to universtiy, but the days blur into one, and weeks feel like minutes. She doesn’t know if she’ll be ready then. She doesn’t know if she ever will be again, or if she ever was before Sana.

Momo gets pushed by Jihyo, Nayeon, and Jeongyeon to start coming out of her shell more, and instead of ignoring them, she allows herself to start talking wtih them again. Sana’s the one that pushes her forward.

“They miss you too, Momo,” Sana tells her as they lay side by side. “They already lost me, are you going to let them lose you too?”

“I shouldn’t even be here anymore,” Momo says through gritted teeth.

Sana gives her a sad look. “But you are. Don’t be selfish.”

Sana, after all, is always right, so Momo starts going down for dinner. It’s just one meal, and she never really talks, but it’s _something_ , and she catches Nayeon and Jeongyeon share a small smile, and she swears, she sees Jihyo wipe a tear.

The three girls start making sure dinner is always Momo’s favorite foods, as if afraid one wrong meal will turn Momo away again. It makes Momo heart ache—had she really disappeared that much? Sana always sits next to her, the empty chair at the dining table never occupied by any one else. They all know it’s Sana seat, because it had been before.

Sana sits next to her, and jumps into Jihyo, Nayeon, and Jeongyeon’s conversations as if she’s still there, as if they could hear her, even if they don’t.

Momo eats, and sometimes feels full, and sometimes even smiles.

//

Momo runs into Mina at the graveyard. A part of Momo is shocked, because she hadn’t seen Mina is so long. In fact, if she thinks about it, she hasn’t seen Mina since Sana’s funeral. She can’t believe she hadn’t realized that; she can’t believe she forgot about her other best friend.

Mina’s crying, that much Momo can see, as Mina stands in front of the tombstone, head bent down, slender shoulders shaking.

Sana suddenly appears next to Momo. “Mina,” Sana breathes out with a sad smile.

Momo doesn’t know what to do. She stands there, awkward and unmoving, and maybe guilty.

“You know,” Sana says after a while. “She was the last one I remember seeing before…” She trails off. “I miss her. Don’t you?”

Momo doesn’t answer, instead, she turns away and walks off.

//

It was never just Momo and Sana. For as long as Momo had known, it had been Momo, Mina, and Sana. They were the three muskateers, best friends before they were born, their parents neighbours. They grew up together, went to the playground, were classmates for most of their lives.

It was sandbox love, and sandbox love never really dies.

They left together too. It was Mina chasing after ballet, and Sana after theatre, and Momo after hip hop. They left Japan, went to the states for high school and college, and lived together. It was late nights spent cramming, with Mina encouraging them to do better in school, and Sana singing at the top of her lungs, while Momo munched her way through their food. It was yoga on Saturdays, because Mina insisted it was good for them, clubbing on Fridays, because Sana was carefree and liked to have fun, and it was movies on Wednesdays, because Momo liked comedies.

It was home far away from home. As long as Mina and Sana were with her, Momo never felt like she ever left behind anything.

It was in their freshman year that Mina had moved out. There was a young girl in her ballet class named Tzuyu who came from Taiwan, that needed an extra roommate. Tzuyu lived with her girlfriend Chaeyoung, and Chaeyoung’s best friend Dahyun.

At that time, Mina, Sana, and Momo had been living with Jeongyeon and Jihyo, but things were getting crowded, especially with Jeongyeon’s girlfriend, Nayeon moving in.

Mina didn’t mind, and she went to live with them. That was when the dynamic between Momo and Sana started to shift. When Mina started spending less time with them, and stopped living with them, Momo started to see how different she acted around Sana, started realizing what she felt for Sana.

They were all still best friends, and would always will be, but things between Momo and Sana started to bloom, a connection that Mina was no longer a part of.

Saturdays for yoga became a Mina, Chaeyoung, Tzuyu, and Dahyun thing. Fridays for clubbing was for Momo, Sana, and Nayeon. Wednesdays stopped happening altogether. It wasn’t anything malicious, it was growing up, and having lives outside of each other.

But they still had their groupchat for memes, and sleepovers when they weren’t tired, and Mina still attended all of Momo’s dance performances with Sana, and Momo still tried to stay awake during Mina’s ballet shows, with Sana pinching her side, and Momo and Mina would always pretend to understand Sana’s theatre pieces.

It was still sandbox love, just a little older, just a little different.

//

Sana walks with Momo, a disappointed expression on her face. “Why’d you do that?”

Momo doesn’t know _why_. She keeps walking and doesn’t answer. Her chest feels heavy, her eyes prickled with tears. Seeing Mina…

“Momo,” Sana says again. “You can’t ignore me.”

Momo does. She keeps walking, faster now, as if she can outwalk a fucking _ghost_.

“Momo,” Sana says again, calmly, patiently. “Stop.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kudos are highly appreciated as well as comments ! :)


	3. if you know

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sana encourages Momo to do the right thing.

When the news hit them that Sana had passed, Momo’s world shrunk into just her and her phone. She’d sent Sana a message just five minutes ago. _hey what do u want for dinner_ , she’d asked.

She can still remember Jeongyeon holding her up as she collapsed in the living room, can still remember Jihyo on the phone talking with a frantic Dahyun, while Nayeon was talking to a police officer.

Momo couldn’t hear anything, or see anything. Someone had turned a light switch off, and she’d simply laid in Jeongyeon’s embrace, unmoving.

In a few hours, when she came to, she started to shake, and Nayeon, Jeongyeon, and Jihyo eyed her with concern, but Momo could see it in their faces too: they were devastated. Nayeon was crying silently into her hands, while Jeongyeon rubbed her back with a haunted expression.

Jihyo was the one who opened the door for Dahyun, Chaeyoung, Tzuyu, and Mina. Chaeyoung and Dahyun and Tzuyu were quick to express condolences, and Chaeyoung and Dahyun even started crying with Nayeon, while Mina simply bowed to everyone with an expression Momo couldn’t decipher.

Mina sat next to her, and held her hand out.

Momo held it. It doesn’t feel right, not without Sana.

//

Momo stops walking once they reach the park. It’s night time now, and her legs ache from the distance she’d just traversed. During that whole time, Sana was unrelenting, calling her name out.

Momo reaches the bench, _their_ bench, and sits down. Sana sits next to her.

“Momo,” Sana says, “What’s wrong?”

Momo looks at her, sees the concern pulling at Sana’s furrowed eyebrows. She looks at Sana: still in that pastel sweater, hair tied up in a ponytail, cheekbones sharp. If Momo tried, maybe she could still smell the cherry scent Sana always carried with her.

She starts to cry, and Sana’s eyes widen in surprise.

“Everything,” she answers after a while. “Everything’s wrong.”

//

Momo gets home eventually, partly because she’s hungry, mostly because she’s afraid of scaring the other girls into thinking she’s given up again. Sana isn’t with her. She’d disappeared sometime in the park, while Momo was crying, and hadn’t appeared even when Momo had reached the apartment.

When she walks in, Jihyo’s already placing down the food, while Jeongyeon sets the table. Nayeon isn’t there.

“Hey!” Jihyo greets her. “You’re just in time.”

Jeongyeon gives her a small smile. “You look tired. You good?”

Momo nods and changes the subject. “Where’s Nayeon?”

“She’s…” Jeongyeon trails off, sharing a look with Jihyo. “She just went to check up on a friend.”

Momo furrows her eyebrows. “Is everything alright?”

Jihyo and Jeongyeon both look hesitant, and this makes Momo feel a little annoyed. Were they hiding something from her? Did they think she was some fragile piece of shit?

“You can tell me, you know. I don’t wanna be taken by surprise,” she says. _Not again_ , lingers in the air.

“She went to check up on Mina,” Jihyo replies very slowly. “Mina came back from Japan. You know…they got closer this year.”

_Japan? She went back home? How long was she gone?_

“I see.” Momo doesn’t say anything else for awhile, and as they sit down and eat in an uncomfortable, suffocating silence, she finds herself asking, “is Mina okay?”

Jeongyeon bites her lip. “Well…she’s _back_ , if that’s anything. Honestly, Momo, we don’t know.”

“Oh.”

The guilt in Momo’s heart grows.

//

Sana comes back eventually. Momo knows Sana can’t stay away, and the fact that she’s a ghost now, haunting Momo— _Sana can’t stay away_.

“Where did you go?” Momo asks her. “I mean…in general. When you disappear. Where do you go?”

Sana shrugs and meets Momo’s gaze. “The other world, mostly. I can’t stay for long there, though.”

“Huh? Why not?”

“I…can’t say.” Sana looks down. “I don’t know too. The others say it’s unfinished business or something.”

Momo raises an eyebrow. “Others?”

Sana nods. “Yeah, the others.”

Momo sits against the wall and watches Sana very carefully. “Do you want to go to the…other world?”

“It’s nice there,” Sana answers, wistfully. “Maybe someday. I don’t know. I still feel something calling me here. It’s like I can’t stay there yet.”

Momo doesn’t say it, but she’s glad. She holds out her hand, and Sana takes it, but they both feel nothing.

“You should talk to Mina,” Sana says after a while.

“I know,” Momo replies.

“Okay, if you know.”

//

Momo hasn’t really talked to Tzuyu, Dahyun, or Chaeyoung since the funeral, which was roughly around three months ago by now. It wasn’t for the lack of trying from Tzuyu, Dahyun, or Chaeyoung’s sides—they’d reached out to Momo a lot during the first few weeks, and then every now and the following month, and by the third, it seemed as if they were getting their own updates from Jihyo, Jeongyeon, and Nayeon, and just decided to leave Momo alone until such time that she was ready.

Which, well—she wasn’t sure if she was ready now, but Sana had been pushing her for some time, and the guilt inside her chest had bloomed from a single flower to a whole fucking bouquet, so—she was here. She was here, and that was maybe something. 

She stood in front of the apartment complex, and took a few deep breaths. Next to her, Sana is all supportive smiles and encouraging words.

“You can do this,” Sana tells her.

And because it’s Sana that says it, Momo believes it.

//

(Momo hadn't liked Tzuyu, Dahyun, and Chaeyoung at first. She briefly recalls the weird animosity she held towards them in the beginning, when she didn't know them yet, when they were faceless people that got to be roommates with Mina, when she thought Tzuyu had stolen Mina away from her and Sana. That had changed quickly enough, because Dahyun was loud, and obnoxious, and witty, which was always a win in Momo's book, and Chaeyoung reminded Momo so much of Jeongyeon she couldn't really hate her, and Tzuyu - Tzuyu was quiet and a little intimidating, but she'd always been nice, and her and Sana had even formed some sort of bond at some point. 

Momo had known then that Mina was in good hands. That Mina would be okay.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as always comments and kudos keep me going :)


	4. for me? (or for you)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Enter: Mina. Momo deals with her selfishness.

When Dahyun opens the door and sees Momo, she cannot hide her surprise. Her eyes widen, and her mouth forms an ‘o’, as she blinks once, twice, thrice at Momo.

Momo clears her throat. “Hey, Dahyun.”

A beat, and then—

Dahyun’s hugging her. Momo is a bit taken aback, because she hasn’t really touched anyone in so long, and her body becomes stiff. Dahyun notices after a while and immediately pulls back as if she’s been burned.

“Ohmygod, I’m so _sorry_. Momo, it’s really you.”

Momo nods, unsure of what else to say.

“Come in, come in.” Dahyun ushers her inside. “Chaeyoung and Tzuyu are on a date, so they’re not here right now, but Mina is upstairs.”

Sana filters in after Momo, and watches Dahyun with an amused expression. “She dyed her hair,” she comments. “Blue and purple highlights really suit her, don’t you think?”

Momo doesn’t answer. She doesn’t want Dahyun to think she’s _fucking insane_ on their first meeting in three months.

Dahyun tells her to sit down, and Momo and Sana sit side by side, while Dahyun fusses. _Do you want tea, how about a snack, how are the others, you’re feeling alright_ —she keeps talking and moving, like she can’t sit still, and she keeps eyeing Momo as if she’s not sure this is real either. Momo does her best to answer the questions _no I’m fine, I ate earlier, the others are good, I’m not yet there but I’m trying_ , etc.

After a while, Sana says, “Ask about Mina.”

Momo clears her throat and interrupts Dahyun’s next question. “How’s Mina doing?”

Dahyun looks down at her hands. She takes a long while before she answers. “Honestly…we know she’s trying, but…you know Mina, Momo.” She looks up and meets Momo’s gaze. “You’ve known her longer than any of us…and we just don’t know how to help her, but we know she’s trying.”

“She…went to Japan, right?”

Dahyun nods. “She left for about a month, but she’s back now. She’s doing better, we can all see that, and she does normal Mina stuff, but…of course, it’s not the same.” She shrugs. “I don’t know. We’re all just trying, you know?”

Momo’s mouth has gone dry. “…yeah.”

“Do you want…do you want to talk to her?”

Momo meets Dahyun’s perceptive gaze, and she doesn’t even need to say yes, because Dahyun gets it. Dahyun says, “You know where her room is.”

Sana stands up first, and Momo takes a moment. “Come on,” Sana says with a soft smile. She holds her hand out. “We can do this…together.”

This time, Momo doesn’t care if Dahyun thinks she’s insane as she reaches out to grab Sana’s hand. She feels nothing, but it’s always enough.

Together, they walk upstairs.

//

Momo takes a deep breath, and stares at Mina’s door for a few seconds. A part of her feels heavy, another part feels numb—like she’s floating in between being upset, and feeling nervous.

“It’s going to be okay,” Sana tells her with the softest of smiles. “This is Mina.”

_This is Mina_ , Momo reminds herself. When had she ever felt nervous or bad because of Mina? Mina had always been so kind, so understanding, a part of Momo’s life that was just as permanent as Sana.

She knocks. A beat or two pass before a soft voice from inside the room, one so familiar to Momo, calls out, “I’m not hungry. I’ll eat later, Dahyun.”

Momo’s throat locks up, and she has to take a deep breath before she gets her voice to work. “It’s…it’s not Dahyun.”

A long pause follows. Momo’s sure Mina knows it’s her, and the fact that a few seconds pass before the door starts to unlock makes Momo wonder if she lost this too. She hadn’t been the best friend Mina needed her to be, and she certainly had not allowed Mina or anyone else for that matter be a friend to her after Sana had passed. Momo had shut everyone out.

The door opens, and there: Mina stands, back straight as always, slender shoulders shrinking into itself, like she’s trying to disappear. Her eyes are a little puffy, but other than that she’s as elegant and immaculate looking as she’s always been.

Momo hears Sana gasp. “ _Oh, Minari_ ,” she says under her breath.

“Hi,” Momo says after a while.

Mina tilts her head to the side and regards Momo with an expression Momo can’t decipher. She doesn’t answer Momo immediately, but she does step aside, and Momo gets the memo.

Momo enters her room, and Sana trails behind.

//

“You can sit,” Mina says, motioning to the chair by her desk. She herself sits down on her bed.

“Thank you,” Momo mumbles, sitting down.

The silence that falls around them is heavy, unfamiliar. Momo can’t look at her. She’s feeling a hundred emotions inside of her—guilt, anger, sadness, _longing_. For what? She can’t really tell. All her emotions have been a mess these days.

“Why are you here?” Mina asks her, but her tone isn’t unkind, it’s more probing, curious.

Momo keeps her gaze on her lap. She takes a deep breath. “I…” She stops, doesn’t know how to say _I’m sorry, I miss you, what’s happening, I’m lost_.

“You can do it,” Sana whispers in her ear. “Look at her and talk to her, Momoring. It’s _just_ Mina. We’ve known Mina forever. Come on.”

Momo takes a deep breath, and readies herself. She slowly lifts her head up, and looks at Mina. Mina meets her gaze. Mina’s eye bags are heavy, her cheeks hollowed out as if she’s missed a hundred meals she wasn’t supposed to be missing, and she’s biting her lip.

“Mina,” Momo finally says, and because she can’t say all the jumbled up lines and heartaches within her, she just starts crying. She cries for what feels like longer than it should be, and Sana is too stunned into silence to comfort her, and maybe Mina is too, because Mina doesn’t do anything, or say anything. When Momo’s calmed down after awhile, she furiously wipes at her face and gives a series of apologies.

Mina holds a hand up. “Momo,” she says. “What are you doing here?” Her gaze is pitying, and sad, and maybe broken.

Momo stares at her, and finally says, “I came here for you.”

A pause follows. “For me?” Mina’s tone is incredulous, as if she can’t believe that Momo would be there for her, and Momo wants to kick herself for being such an absent best friend.

“For me,” Mina repeats, slowly. “Or for you?”

Momo closes her eyes in surrender. She doesn’t know.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> do u guys like where this is going? also curious what are ur other ships? doesn't have to be in twice :> mine are minayeon, yejisu, chuuves, seulrene, and 2jin


End file.
